


The Storm

by Flarenwrath



Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, World of Warcraft
Genre: Implied/Referenced Character Death, Light Angst, Lighthouse AU?, Lots of weird void shit, M/M, Siren AU?, Siren sex?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:01:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24100249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flarenwrath/pseuds/Flarenwrath
Summary: Mathias Shaw is trying to outrun mistakes from his past but after a fateful encounter with a one Flynn Fairwind (who may not be what he seems) everything catches up to him.
Relationships: Flynn Fairwind/Mathias Shaw, Mathias Shaw/Edwin VanCleef
Comments: 13
Kudos: 41
Collections: Fairshaw Week 2020





	The Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Watched the Lighthouse and drank some Kraken ... ... bon apetit?

Dark waves beat against the little skiff threatening to upend her, rocking the small vessel dangerously to one side before lurching back again as the sea sloshed under them. The ferryman at the helm was unfazed and continued his banter about how he hadn’t been this far out of the channel in a dog’s age, not since they last had a caretaker for the local lighthouse. Shaw was having a hard time parsing the details as he was desperately trying to keep his lunch from making a return. With each battering wave that shook them, his grip on the ship’s frame tightened until his knuckles were almost white and the wood threatened to splinter from the force.

“Aye, it’s been abandoned for far too long, but I’m glad thems noble folk down in Boralus finally saw fit to send us another keeper. Maybe now the trading Galleons will feel safe enough to return to our docks.” He could hear the bitterness in the ferryman’s voice, one he was far too familiar with.

“Those with means don’t care about those without,” Shaw managed through gritted teeth, parroting words he had heard a hundred times before.

“Exactly!” the large man bellowed, “Ya think they would want to take better care of the people of Stormsong since we’re the ones who train their sages, but I fear times are changing.” Shaw wasn’t sure if he was talking to him or to the sea, “They even got themselves a little temple to the Light in Brennadam these days!” The ferryman scoffed and spit into the waves in annoyance.

Thankfully for Shaw’s stomach, as they rounded the next bend and out into open sea, the waves calmed to only a gentle swaying. It was then that the lighthouse finally came into view. She was on top of a large rocky isle covered in grasses too stubborn to die, a little way from the mouth of Stormsong’s bay. Her body was a dull yellowish grey instead of the pristine white of the lighthouses back home on the mainland, and her beacon had long gone dead and cold.

“There she be, Mister VanCleef,” the ferryman called out as he steered them around the back of the isle and to the small dock at its front. Shaw’s jaw clenched painfully tight at the name as he gathered together his small personal bags in preparation to dock. The large Kul Tiran man tied the ship off and offered a hand to help Shaw depart, but Shaw decidedly refused to accept. His stubbornness only earned a shrug in response.

“This ain’t the mainland, laddie. Don’t forget that now, you hear me?” he called out as Shaw did one final check that he had all of his effects offloaded. “I don’t want to have to wait another six months for a new keeper, just because you got yourself tangled up with some siren.” 

Shaw nodded in response and reassured, “I have no intention of it.” 

The look the ferryman gave him was incredulous but he didn’t push him on it, and in a matter of moments had freed the little boat and had set off once more, leaving him alone with nothing but his bags and an overgrown gravel road leading up to the small house he could barely make out at the base of the lighthouse. He shifted the weight of his bags and began his trek.

From what the shipmaster in Boralus had told him, they normally sent at least two sailors for each Lighthouse watch but these days they simply couldn’t afford it. Not financially, but after the loss of their Grand Admiral and the subsequent falling out with the other human Kingdoms of the Alliance, the priority usage of good working men was for sailing. Shaw probably wouldn’t have been offered even this if the shipmaster hadn’t sensed some lie in his story to begin with and he couldn’t fault him for it. If you couldn’t trust the suspicious mainlander to work with a crew, then send him someplace where all you need is a warm body to keep the gears turning and the torch lit.

It’s probably what he would have done if he were in the same position.

The house, if he could call it that, had almost completely rotted away. The wooden planks serving as walls against the ocean wind splintered and fractured to just the touch, and just the effort of opening the front door was enough to almost rip the hinges from their bolts in the wooden frame. Inside was no better and Shaw quickly surveyed what he had to work with: there was a small table made of legs of different lengths and two accompanying chairs, a china cabinet that seemed to double as a tool shed, a kitchen with plumbing that didn’t work, and a mattress about as hard as the stone ground itself on an iron frame.

Not the worst place Shaw had lived, but certainly not what he had grown accustomed to in his last years working in Stormwind.

He dropped his bags at the foot of the bed and unpacked and straightened up what he could. There was going to be a lot of hard labor to replace the rotted wood of the house to make it livable again, and that would be on top of running the lighthouse, but the idea of keeping busy appealed to him. The harder he had to work at this, the less likely it would be that his mind would have the luxury of thinking about other things.

~.~.~.

He braced himself with a hand against a tree as he tried to catch his breath. The man behind him was hardly any better off, although he should have expected as much. They don’t feed prisoners well, and running this deep into Elwynn Forest on foot under cover of darkness was difficult enough for Shaw, who hadn’t skipped a needed meal in years.

“Are you sure they won’t come for us?” Edwin hissed between breaths, his dark eyes flashing in the patches of moonlight that filtered through the thick canopy overhead.

“I’m sure,” Shaw replied as he pulled himself together. The guards to the stockades had been garroted to the near point of decapitation and the fire he set off in Old Town was close enough to the palace that it would keep the rest of the guards busy looking for dissenters and away from their prison break through the canals. 

“Once we make it across the river and into Duskwood, we should be able to slip back to Westfall before the sunrise,” Shaw reassured as he took this small moment of safety to more closely inspect Edwin’s injuries. He had lost weight during his weeks in the stocks that even the loose prison garb could do nothing to hide and his olive skin had a number of new scars that he wasn’t intimately familiar with, but the heavy muscle of the stonemason’s body was far from withered and still as deadly as ever. There was a healing bruise to the side of Edwin’s left jaw, the purple fading to green in its healing, and Shaw tentatively stepped closer so he could brush the tips of his fingers against his welted cheek.

Edwin’s instincts must have been on high alert from their escape, because no sooner had skin touched skin than Shaw’s hand had been violently smacked away.

“Do not touch me!” the man spat, causing Shaw to flinch from the unexpected vitriol. He deserved this hate and he knew it. After all, it was in no small part his own actions that lead to Edwin’s capture in the first place. 

“Do you think I am not onto your schemes, Mathias?” A scarred and calloused hand was suddenly around Shaw’s throat as Edwin pinned him roughly against a tree. “Your plots with good King Wrynn to destroy me?” 

Shaw’s throat spasmed around the tight grip as he struggled to breathe, to defend himself. //That wasn’t true!//, he tried but all that came out was a soft choking sputtering.

“Don’t worry-“ Edwin promised darkly as he pulled a military issued dagger free from one of the sheaths on Shaw’s thigh. “I’ll be sure to send your Master along after you soon, Dog!”

~.~.~

Shaw bolted upright in his bed, the world still spinning around him as the nightmare faded and reality slowly crept back to the foreground. He drew his knees to his chest as he ran his fingers through his sweat-dampened hair. It seemed no matter how many leagues he put between himself and that cursed Stormwind he couldn’t outrun his own traitorous dreams. 

He started the morning much in the same way he did prior to showing up on this rock by making himself a strong pot of coffee and plotting out his next steps hour by hour to maximize his efficiency. First, he would find where the shed was and evaluate how much wood he had to work with, then he could prioritize the repairs to the house by both urgency as well as the means available to fix them. Then he would go to the lighthouse. Thankfully not even the shipmaster of Boralus had expected him to get her in working order on the first day, but as it was the main purpose of his station, he should at least start by getting her light working again. And lastly, as time allowed, he would familiarize himself with the island. 

The shed was easy enough to find, nestled between two large boulders for support with a more resilient roof than the main house had as it had the one duty of keeping what little timber and coal he had from being ruined by the sea. Shaw pursed his lips as he pawed through the beams. There was enough for the urgent repairs, namely the boards in the walls that had rotted away to leave fist sized holes in their wake, but not enough for the doorframes, floors, and roofing. 

He let out small sigh. It was inevitable that he would have to take the small skiff docked on the island into Mariner’s Strand or even into Brennadam itself eventually for supplies, but he had hoped he would have had at least the first week to himself before braving the scrutiny of others once more.

By the time he had set to work fixing the largest of the holes, it was already well past midday. It seemed what skills he had learned as a youth in construction had been lost over his more recent years in military service. After all, he hardly needed to worry about replacing the walls of his home when the king’s barracks were nicer than all the farming homes in Westfall combined. The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth and he tossed the little tool bag to the ground in his bitter frustration.

After a quick meal of hard tack and dried fish, he made his way up the steep trail towards the lighthouse. The wind up here whipped around him and he pulled his wool jacket tight to stave off the chill. When he made it to the top and at the lighthouse’s one and only entrance, he found the padlock of the door broken and rusting in the grass on the ground.

//Looters…//, he mused as he pulled open its heavy iron door open and made his way into the service room. There was a near full tankard of oil at the base of its wrought iron spiraled stair and a set of matches. Both of which boded well for his plans of getting the girl operational sooner rather than later. He made his way up the stair and to the optic landing. The storm panes were cloudy from the encrusted salt and would need a heavy cleaning, but the lens and the wick at its core were more pristine than he could have hoped for. If pirates had broken into the lighthouse, they must have found whatever it was they wanted and abandoned the rest. 

//Either that or someone had got to them first//, his always calculating mind offered. Shaw shook his head. There was no reason for him to think like that any longer. His job was here now, and lighthouses weren’t in danger of assassinations. 

He opened the storm pane that led outside the optic room and stepped out onto the iron railed balcony. From there he could see the entire island as well as the small islands and large jutting rocks that littered the small mouth of the bay. To the left were the tall peaks that separated Stormsong Valley from Tiragarde Sound and to the right was the large island home of the Tidesages.

The people of Brennadam were more willing to speak of the Tidesages than those in Boralus, but even they only referred to them in awe and whispers. Shaw wasn’t clear what the difference was between them and the mages of Dalaran, but the Kul Tirans stood firm in the distinction between the two. From the lighthouse balcony he could almost make out something nestled in the cliffs of the Shrine, albeit obscured from casual view by the mist and brine of the sea.

He narrowed his eyes and focused, making note of where rock ended and carved stone begun. If he wasn’t mistaken, and he never was, the island shrine had a very large and sealed door leading out from the rock itself and to the sea.

The idea of what it was that was being kept in there drifted to him once until a cold gust of the evening wind ripped past him. It sent the bolt of a shiver down his spine and forced him to retreat back inside.

~.~.~

“The Brotherhood grows stronger everyday!” the King exclaimed as he slammed his bare fist on the expansion plans for the city. “That unionizer VanCleef is behind these attacks and yet he tells _MY_ people I am the tyrant!”

Shaw had quickly acclimated to King Varian Wrynn’s temper. It should have been expected from someone who had so much pressure on his shoulders, after all. The very survival of all the humans south of Arathor was pinned to the success or the failure of this one man. He only wished he could do more to help ease that burden…

“He acts like the matter of gold is one that I can simply magic into existence…” Varian continued, the storm of his anger dying down as weariness took its place. This was the face that he only showed for a select few and Shaw was proud to now be counted as one of those people. “I am offering shelter and food for those who are willing to work to create a new Kingdom. Gold will come once trade can be reestablished with Lordaeron and perhaps even Gilneas or Kul Tiras, but they will take no such chances on us if we cannot even secure our own borders from Gnolls…”

“Each time those bandits attack us, we are losing valuable men and supplies that are meant for Stormwind’s people,” his face twisted into a snarl before he continued, “And that VanCleef wastes them on weapons and brigands!”

A tightness grew in Shaw’s chest. He knew intimately what it was like to grow up like those families with nothing but the clothes on their backs, just looking for a place of safety. Edwin might have been the closest thing he had ever had to a lover, but some sacrifices were going to have to be made if anyone wanted to see this kingdom thrive.

“Leave the matter to me, my King,” he promised with a bow, “I will have him brought to face your justice in chains.”

~.~.~

Shaw’s eyes snapped awake to the blackness of his room, the solitary candle having long since burned out in its stand. His sweat had soaked his sheets and his breath was shaking in his lungs. He inhaled and exhaled to the crashes of the waves on the beach in an attempt to center himself the same way he had done that morning (yesterday morning?). As his pulse slowed and his senses returned to him, he realized he could make out an unfamiliar rise and fall of sound in the air entirely separate from the ocean’s wake. 

Curious, Shaw pulled his boots on and made his way down the gravel path to the dock; the half moon peeking through the clouds gave just enough light for him not to trip over himself but barely enough to make out the difference between a rock and driftwood. He paused for a moment and closed his eyes to better listen- Yes! There was definitely something nearby. A deep bass tremble of a tune drifted on the breeze, all at once feeling both familiar like a song he had heard once in his youth and had long since forgotten and yet entirely like something impossible to predict: like the nonlinear weaving of a dream.

It sounded like… //Someone singing?// He followed the sound down the beach and around the back side of the island’s cliff to a place he had not explored before during the daylight hours. There on an outcropping was someone sitting overlooking the waves and, sure enough, singing with only the sea and the night sky to hear.

And himself, it would seem.

Shaw was about to walk closer, to call out to this stranger and ask how they managed to sail to the island in the middle of the night, when all the air was suddenly ripped from his lungs. What he had once thought were the strangers’ legs resting on the rocky ledge was instead a thick muscled tail: the glint of the moonlight reflecting off the wet scales and webbings of their lower body.

He must have made a gasp of shock, because the singing stopped abruptly and the head of the stranger suddenly whipped towards him, their long thick wet hair like hanging seaweed obscuring their face from the night’s light. And yet, he could still see the glint of eyes shining at him from the dark void where a face should be, like a cat’s would when reflecting firelight.

Shaw’s mouth went suddenly very dry and his body tensed, begging for him to flee.

The creature let out a loud ear-splitting shriek –

~.~.~

-And his eyes snapped open once more in the safety of his rickety bed. It was already well past midday by the placement of the sun peeking through the holes in the roof, and he cursed himself for oversleeping, something he had not done in years, but perhaps the stress of things was finally catching up to him. It was already too late for him to do any of the other repairs he had originally planned on doing today, so he conceded and allowed himself the rest of the day to simply wander the island. 

The first place he investigated was the rocky outcropping along the shore from his dream last night. It turned out that such a place did exist on the island and exactly where he had dreamed it to be. He must have seen it from the balcony of the lighthouse, he mused. Much to his relief upon closer inspection, while there was a small ocean cave nestled behind the shoals, there was no ocean creature and no sign that such a being had ever been there. Reassured that his dream was in fact exactly that, he continued walking the perimeter of the isle’s coast at a more relaxed pace.

He had made it around the back half of the island, where the rocky cliffs were the steepest and the lighthouse overlooked the shore, when he stumbled across another person. The man was laying (sleeping?) on the beach, his long auburn hair pulled out of his face by a loose ponytail with only the straggling bangs too short to reach the tie free to frame his face. He had a strong jaw and only half kept facial hair where once could see the clear definition of moustache and goatee, but the rest of his stubble was clearly more than a day or two old. He was dressed like a sailor with a heavy leather coat and boots resting on the shore next to him as he basked in the afternoon sun.

Shaw hesitated a long moment, debating exactly what to do with this unexpected visitor, before finally caving and calling out.

“What are you doing here?”

“Huh?” the man said as he jostled up with a startle. He looked over to Shaw before flashing him a pair of sea green eyes and a toothed grin, “Finally sent a new keeper out for the lighthouse, did they?”

Shaw only pursed his lips, “Indeed. But I say it again, what are you doing here?”

The man laughed and sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. “I come here every now and again for fishing,” he gestured to a single fishing pole he had buried halfway into the sand and supported with a few rocks to keep it upright. “Not as much competition this far out from the harbor and since there wasn’t anyone keeping guard here for so long, it just seemed like a waste to not take the opportunity… Right, Mate?”

Shaw didn’t know much about the fishing life despite his time in Stormwind, but he could relate to wanting a meal you didn’t have to fight for.

“Well this place is occupied once more,” he said firmly but without much actual threat behind it, “You should take your things and be on your way.”

The man looked him up and down, sizing him up, before responding, “I hear ya, Mate, I wouldn’t want to get involved in ‘the navy’s perilous line of duty’-“ the tease was not lost on Shaw, and he frowned in annoyance “-but I tell ya what, maybe you look the other way every now and then and maybe I drop a fish or two on my way back to my boat?” The man pulled his leather coat off the rocky beach to reveal a small basket with three decently sized fish in them as a show of good faith for the bribe.

Shaw’s first instinct was to tell the man off and to threaten him should he ever catch his face around here, but that life wasn’t his anymore and that fresh fish certainly looked better than any of the dried or canned goods his larder currently was stocked with.

“Pleasure doin’ business with ya!” the man laughed, jumping to his feet before taking Shaw’s hand in his own and giving him a firm shake, “The name’s Flynn Fairwind.”

“Mathias VanCleef,” Shaw answered in return: a practiced response from his months after having left Stormwind.

“Mathias it is, then!” Flynn said eagerly, giving his hand another shake before abruptly letting it go. He reached down into the basked at pulled out the largest fish of his catch that day before depositing the wet and scaly thing into Shaw’s bare hands as payment. 

“You have yourself a pleasant evening, Mathias,” he said with a tip of an imaginary hat before he picked up his things and made his way down the beach and around the next corner of the isle, presumably toward his boat.

Shaw looked down at the dead fish who looked back at him and he wondered how far he could possibly fall if he kept breaking rules for a pair of pretty eyes.

~.~.~

Sneaking up on the guards had been easy enough, after all he was the one who had positioned their stations and dictated their shifts down to the last minute. Garroting them from behind while they scratched futilely at the wire digging into the flesh of their neck had been another thing entirely. Shaw tried his best to forget that he knew the families these guards would be leaving behind and instead focus on the task at hand, freeing Edwin VanCleef.

Tricking his friend and onetime lover into a trap was harder on him than he had expected, and after ruminating for more than a week he could no longer stand it. He understood why Edwin had to be removed for the greater good of both Stormwind and her people, but it turned out he couldn’t live with himself if that meant that same man be tortured and, one day soon, killed for it.

When the body of the guard stopped twitching, Shaw eased his corpse to the floor before looting through his pockets for a specific set of keys. Once he pulled them free from the inside of his breast pocket, he made his way swiftly and silently down the Stockades halls. The roaring of the firebells above were enough to muffle any sound of heels against stone until he was finally in front of his intended’s cell.

“What now?” Edwin hissed, his throat raspy from Light knows what, “Did you not get enough from your games earlier?”

“Edwin, it’s me… It’s Mathias,” he whispered back, not even waiting for a response before he slid the heavy key into the cell door and unlatching it with a thunk.

“Mathias…?” he questioned, raising his head from its resting place against his shoulder as he sat on his prison cot. Edwin’s silky black hair parted, revealing his face in the dim torch light. His dark eyes narrowed in suspicion at his one time friend, “What are you doing here?”

The suspicion was warranted, but it did nothing to lessen the sting. Shaw swallowed around the lump in his throat as he swung the cell door open wide.

“I’m here to help you escape,” he kept his eyes fixed to the stone, unable to take the hate that was bound to be burning at him from Edwin’s eyes, “We should hurry while we still can.” He heard the springs of the cot under Edwin creak and shift as he stood and the padding of his bare feet against the cold stone of the ground as he stepped closer.

“You came for me?” he questioned when he was nothing but a breath away from Shaw: the only thing left between himself and sure freedom

“Of course…” Shaw could only whisper in response. His chest tightened and he dared a glance up to the other man’s face. He had more hard lines etched into his brow and there was a thin scar near the edge of his right eye that he didn’t remember, but otherwise it was still Edwin. The same face he had studied so many years ago in the dying embers of the firelight as they camped in whatever abandoned farmstead they happened to find that week.

Edwin reached a calloused hand out and gently ran his thumb along Shaw’s jawline, one that he easily leaned into.

“Mathias, you really shouldn’t have…” there was a hitch in Edwin’s voice that he hadn’t heard in a long time- not since his wife had died, leaving him to care for their daughter on his own. While he couldn’t see them, he knew there must be tears welling up in those dark eyes of his. He opened his mouth to say something, some promise or reassurance perhaps, but he was cut off by the press of Edwin’s rough lips against his own.

~.~.~

The next morning had Shaw patching up the small boat in the island’s dockyard, filling in some of her holes with resin and waxing her down in preparation for sailing. He needed to clean those storm panes if any worth while light was going to shine through them once more and, if possible, perhaps get some more wood for the ongoing rebuilding of his small shack. 

Thankfully, the seas proved far smoother on his return trip to Brennadam than on his initial journey out, and upon his arrival the sun was shining at its zenith, warming the streets to welcome the town’s outdoor air markets of the day.

The barkers all took turns chanting out the impeccable quality of each of their wares, all falling deaf on Shaw’s ears as he instead singled out what his eyes and his instinct told him is the truest best quality for price products. Some desalinate cleaning supplies, a few jars of honey, some wild fruits, and a bundle of lumber later, he set back to loading up his small vessel to return to the lighthouse. As he did so, however, he overheard some commotion in the marketplace.

“First time a Tidesage has come to these parts in weeks and you demand I close my business?!” a woman’s voice bellowed over the background chatter. Shaw was hardly the only one who stopped what he was doing to see what was going on.

“The master will only gift his blessings to those who deserve them, not to any common place collector of coins,” a hooded man with barnacles growing at the hem of his robe and ship rope tied around his waist like a belt muttered in retort, his entire face shrouded from view. “You-“ he emphasized with a point of his finger at the tall fisherwoman, “are not worthy of his graces.”

She seemed to take offense to that and tossed a barrel out of her way before charging him, only to be held back by a few other shopkeepers all hissing to her about how he ass a Tidesage and how he spoke for the depths and that she should head his warning for the good of the town. To her own credit, it didn’t look like she was about to back down for some mystic. She spat on the ground at his feet, “Keep your rotten and bloated fish then, I’ll move my business to Fort Daelin where I won’t be harassed by this superstitious nonsense!”

Shaw merely watched from the docks with distant intrigue. He had never seen a Tidesage before despite the fact they were now neighbors of sorts. On some level they reminded him of the monks that lived in the temples to the Light in the distant reaches of the north, past Arathi Highlands. Dedicated, devote… … fanatical. He pursed his lips as he watched the solitary sage wander deeper into the shops, given a wide berth from the other visitors. They reminded him of those scarlet cultists.

~.~.~

When Shaw returned to the lighthouse he was shocked to be greeted upon arrival by none other than Flynn Fairwind, his strange visitor from yesterday.

“Let me help you with that, mate!” he called out cheerfully from the dock as he waved down to him dramatically. Despite his best efforts, no amount of insistence that ‘he was fine’ as enough to dissuade Flynn from his instance on helping unload and carrying the goods back to his ramshackle home.

“You’re doing me a solid by helping me out, the least I can do is return the favor, yeah?” he said cheerfully as he carried the satchel of cleaning supplies and fruits. Shaw, himself, carried the wood as Flynn followed him up to the shed and watched as he stored it away. 

“There is no favor”, Shaw corrected him as he closed the shed and offered his hand to take the satchel from him. “Remember?” Flynn laughed in return but didn’t return the satchel. 

“Right you are…” he teased. Shaw huffed a sigh of annoyance and led the way to his home in an effort to have Flynn call them even and leave him be for the rest of the day. 

If he had known that his agreement with the man was going to include nonstop companionship in addition to simply being on the same island as himself, he would never have agreed to such a thing. The whole purpose of coming out this far into the middle of nowhere was so that he could stew in his own isolation, not so that some fisherman’s son could weasel his way into his life.

“I thank you for your assistance, but unfortunately I have other duties to attend to,” Shaw said firmly as he outstretched his hand to take the satchel from Flynn.

“Alright,” Flynn teased again, “I’ll give you what you want under one condition.” He held the satchel away from Shaw like one might hold a toy away from a schoolyard crush. 

Shaw let out a deep sigh, but relented, “Fine.”

“Tell me why a mainlander wanted to come work a Kul Tiran lighthouse,” Flynn’s eyes flashed with curiosity, and for one very exhausted moment Shaw contemplated telling him the truth.

“I’m trying to move past some poor life choices,” he said instead, which earned a laugh from the other man. Who, in keeping with his word, tossed him the satchel despite his cheap response.

“Aren’t we all, Mate?” Flynn said jovially before rubbing the back of his neck again, “But I’ll tell you a secret of mine, nothing moves the past along faster than some of this-“ he reached down to his belt and pulled free a bladder flask filled with -something- that he offered to Shaw in the half attempted form of a toast. “To leaving the past in the past, yeah?”

Part of him wanted to take it, to drown these nightmares in depths that they could never crawl free from, but the other (more reasonable part) of him told him that drink alone would never be enough to free him from these clutches. 

“Unfortunately, I don’t drink,” he said politely as he opened the door to his little home and stepped in across the threshold, “Another time, maybe?”

To his effort, Flynn’s coy smirk didn’t falter once. “Another time then,” he reiterated with an understanding nod.

~.~.~

He wasn’t sure if it was a dream or a memory.

The sensation of the world spinning under him, the familiar aftermath of a night of drinking hard liquor at the insistence and daring of a familiar conspirator. A hand along his waist and up his ribcage under his shirt, and he could only moan and arch into the touch. He only ever got this drunk when Edwin was by his side, taunting him to take another after another lest he fall behind.

Yet it was hard to feel any remorse or guilt for ending up in such a state so long as Edwin’s large callused hands were on him, touching skin against sensitive skin- tongue pressed hot and heavy against the pulse in his neck so he yearned for more.

“Edwin-!” he cried out as the body over him let out a deep moan of approval against the base of his ear.

How many times had he been like this? Drunk and in Edwin’s bed despite any and all sensibility telling him that this would only lead to disaster and ruin. And yet-

That same hand under his shirt slid up the sensitive skin of his ribs to his chest, thumbing at an already hard nipple before pressing down, biting the nail into his sensitive flesh and making him arch his back and gasp. There was already a thigh pressed between his own and it took everything in him to keep from rolling his hips against it, wanting to feel Edwin against him in the basest of ways.

“You’re so needy for me, Mathias…” Edwin moaned into his ear as he pressed his lower body against him, all but grinding that thigh against the hardness between his legs. The feeling alone forced a small cry from his lips as he ground down to meet him.

~.~.~

He woke up hot and hard. 

His cock tented his small clothes and left frustrated tears in his eyes.

After a quick hard and hot handling of himself, thinking about anything but Edwin, he reached a much-needed climax before resigning himself to the work of the day. 

He used the extra wood he purchased from the town to work on the holes in the roof, shingling away the opened spots where rot withered the previous ceiling with pieces of fresh wood. Once satisfied with the house, he turned to the lighthouse’s storm panes, scrubbing away at the salt encrusted glass until the heavy frosted tint gave way to something clear that the Light could finally penetrate.

Shaw worked until his body was aching and the sun set against the main island. He gazed out at the dying of the light through the now cleaned storm panes of the lighthouse and managed to find a solitary moment of satisfaction in his work. It might not be much, but it was something that he could attribute to himself and himself alone, and for that it was worth it.

As the sunset crept to dusk, movement on the isle to his right drew his attention. 

The large stone gate of the island was open and upon its banisters was movement. 

The movement of human bodies writhing against the weight of ropes suspending them off the cliff face. Shaw felt himself sharply inhale before his eyes snapped open once more to face the day in his little bed.

He blinked his eyes heavily, squeezing them shut tight against the break of day.

Was yesterday a dream? He asked himself as he looked up at the small holes in his house’s ceiling. 

Was he, even now, asleep?

He wasn’t sure, but he stumbled through the motions of his day (dream?) all over again. Fixing the roof, cleaning the storm panes, gazing out across the sea towards the sealed door nestled in the island’s cliffs- this time however there was a voice from the grass of the ground below.

“Hey, Mate, you done yet?” Flynn called out from below. Another day, perhaps, Shaw would have lied and turned him down, today though….

“Yeah. I’ll be down in a second.”

~.~.~

They were sitting at the wobbly table in his house. Both the flask and bottle of rye empty between them.

“Tell me about home,” Flynn asked, slurring even as he said it.

“There is a large forest a little way from Stormwind harbor,” he started, without any hesitation this time. Almost able to see the woods in his drunken haze, even as he described them to Flynn, “The fields grow crops in the spring and summer, and the trees yield in the fall. You can only smell the harbor on strong windy days, otherwise you’d think you’re as far mainland as Arathi itself.”

Flynn stared at him across the table from over his glass, eyeing him like one might prey.

“What? What about you?” he muttered in response.

“Me?” Flynn laughed and poured them both another round from some unknown bottle at his feet. “My home is the sea. Dark harbors and warm pools low from the tide.” Shaw chuckled along with him and shot the drink even as it burned his throat, “But it was always a lonely place, not much in the way of company…”

Shaw nodded in understanding. Other than Edwin, he had a very lonely upbringing, and now that Edwin was gone… it was like a dark shadow over the whole of his youth. “I know what you mean,” he sloshed, but Flynn cut him off before he could continue-

“A very pretty place with very pretty things, but nothing to anchor you from being swept off to sea.” They lock eyes, Flynn’s sea green fixed on his own sky blue. The air around them grew heavy and silent and he could feel the weight of the tide rising on him. 

“I think I’ve had too much to drink…” he murmured and Flynn only nodded before moving to help him up from his chair.

“Let’s get you to bed then,” he said with a purr before wrapping an arm around his waist and easily hoisting him up to his feet.

Shaw didn’t remember the walk back to his bed nor to the salty kisses pressed on his lips before he succumbed to the darkness.

~.~.~

Everything was dark and hot around him.

A slither of something thick and muscled rolled between his legs, forcing his legs to spread wide and a needy moan to roll out of him. Shaw arched his back and rolled his hips against firmness between his legs, grinding his hard cock against it for some much-needed relief. 

“You like that, mate,” Flynn’s hot voice murmured into his ear as his long auburn hair spilled around him, closing them both off from the rest of the world. He didn’t respond with words, instead rolling his hips up against him in another desperate grind of cock against Flynn’s wet and scaled lower body, letting out a soft and needy cry.

Flynn growled in a pitch lower than should be humanly possible that sent shivers down Shaw’s spine and straight to his cock. With each writhing rut of Flynn’s monstrous scaled lower body against him, he could feel his cock grinding more and more against a wet and soft slit. The feeling of which was more than enough to make him throw his head back against his threadbare pillow as he gasped and cried for more.

With another slithering thrust of Flynn’s tail against him, his cock finally found purchase and slid into that waiting hole, forcing a cry from both of their throats as both gently rocked to push the other deeper. Shaw could feel something hard and velvety pressing against him inside that slit, and the pressure of it only pushed him further.

“Please~!” he cried out as he gave into his wants as he wrapped his legs around that thick tail and thrust into his slit over and over again.

~.~.~

This time when Shaw’s eyes snapped open, he couldn’t help but do anything more than lay in his own sweat and cum-stained wet spot on the bed, gasping for breath and praying that whatever nightmares had gripped themselves on him abated sooner rather than later.

He spent all day attempting to start a project before losing all focus and grip on time and ending up three steps backwards from his intended starting position. By the time he was able to situate himself into patching up the far side of the house, the sun was already setting on the horizon.

“Seems like a storm is rolling in, Mate,” Flynn greeted him from the gravel path as he sat straddled on the roof with a few nails dangling uselessly out of his mouth. Shaw looked up to the sky and finally noticed the dark clouds rolling in. Had he been so unfocused to not noticed until now..?

“Mind if I wait it out with you?” he asked with another flash of that smile and sparkling sea green eyes. Shaw knew he would give in before he even opened his mouth to answer.

~.~.~

He didn’t remember the drinking.

He barely remembered the kissing. 

He could hardly keep up with the hands pressed against bare skin as they writhed together on his creaking bedframe.

“Do you want to stay with me?” Flynn whispered hot and heavy against his ear, pressing biting kisses along his neck the whole way. 

“Yes,” Shaw groaned back, eagerly returning every kiss and nip tenfold. 

“Good,” he purred back as he slid a hand down to gasp his cock in a loose hold, “I’ve been wanting you for a while now. I just need you to want me too.”

“I do,” Shaw promised, without fully knowing what he was promising as each of Flynn’s kisses pulled him deeper into the fuzzy darkened haze of lust.

It wasn't something he could have done a week ago before he arrived on this island, or three months ago when he first fled from Stormwind and the retribution that was soon to follow from his treason, or two years ago when Edwin had first asked if he could stay until dawn. But now with Flynn's body flush against his, and the soft whisperings singing promises in his ears, he found that it was inevitable.

~.~.~

The storm raged all through the night, its howling winds shaking the windows and threatening to rip them from their frames. He could hear the waves crashing against the rocks as the tide rose, threatening the very foundation of the house itself.

But with Flynn's arm's wrapped tightly around him, his breath hot and steady against his neck as he slumbered, he couldn't have cared less.

~.~.~

When the dawn broke the next day, Flynn was gone.

The house had flooded with the rise of the tide, and while what little he possessed had been destroyed by the brine of the sea, he had managed to survive its wake unscathed. It took him a moment, but he managed to eventually drag himself from his bed without his usual cup of morning coffee to survey the extent of the damage. Some of the newly-lain wooden panels had managed to survive the storm, but many of them had been pried loose. 

He had never been very skilled with carpentry anyways.

Once outside, the first noticeable change was that the lighthouse been damaged far beyond repair. Its optic section had been completely shattered and many of its rocks had fallen from their place to the ground below. As he entered through its now-doorless entryway he dimly scolded himself for not expecting as much. After all, she was hardly in her prime when he first arrived.

Nonetheless, he climbed her iron spiral stairs to the top balcony, carefully stepping around the shattered glass as he did so.

Despite the rage of the storm, the island seemed livelier than he had ever seen it. A pair of mated seabirds had begun nesting on one of the rocky outcrops and were sending joyful trills to one another, and out in the ocean he could see whales coming in from the open sea and into Stormsong's harbor. But beyond that...

The imposing door that seemed to be carved from the very stone of the island across the way, the one that belonged to those Tidesages, had been blasted open in the night, leaving nothing but crumbling rocks in its wake and a dark twisting mass of _something_ in the darkness of its cavern.

**Author's Note:**

> I would like all of you to submit your 5 page essay on the meaning of this fanfiction in double spaced 12 point font to my twitter dot com


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